– Twenty years after Fausto Brizzi’s cult film comes the Gen Z version of the comedy about the adventures and emotions accompanying the fateful Italian high school exams and the transition to adulthood
Tommaso Cassissa in Notte prima degli esami 3.0
When Notte prima degli esami [+see also:
trailer
film profile] was released in 2006, Fausto Brizzi’s debut film paved the way for a new kind of comedy in Italy after the long reign of cinepanettoni. It was a fresh, intergenerational and romantic work which won local audiences over (earning 16.5 million euros) and which was treated to a sequel (Notte prima degli esami – Oggi [+see also:
trailer
film profile], taking over 12 million euros at the box office) and a French remake (School’s Out [+see also:
trailer
film profile]) the very next year. Anxieties, fears, first loves, stand-offs between teachers and students, friendships put to the ultimate test and generational clashes – all unfolding within the few days preceding the fateful high school exams, the springboard which marks the end of school before catapulting us into adulthood – are returning to our screens twenty years later, revisited in a Gen Z key in Notte prima degli esami 3.0, a film directed by newcomer Tommaso Renzoni who wrote the screenplay alongside Brizzi. The movie is hitting Italian cinemas on 19 March via 01 Distribution, around the start of the traditional 100-day countdown to the exams.
In this film too, nostalgia is key. Whilst the 2006 film was set in the ‘80s, this new chapter of the saga takes place in the present day and is led by modern-day teens, but it also nods to school-leavers from forty years ago, capturing two audiences in one foul swoop. The role formerly entrusted to Nicolas Vaporidis now falls to Tommaso Cassissa (a YouTube star who bears a striking resemblance to the now 44-year-old actor), while the teacher previously played by Giorgio Faletti has become a female teacher nicknamed “the beast”, to whom Sabrina Ferilli lends her features. Cassissa plays Giulio Sabatini, Ferilli plays the teacher, Ms Castelli. And there’s bad blood between the two of them. Giulio was certain he’d have to repeat his final year of high school, and he interprets his unexpected admission to the exams as a provocation: he’s convinced his perfidious teacher has only allowed him entry to humiliate him in front of the board. To prove this really isn’t the case, Giulio’s teacher personally offers to help him prepare for this ultimate test.
As the two of them spend time together over the course of their tutoring sessions, Giulio discovers Castelli’s weak point: an old flame who vanished into thin air and who doesn’t even have a social media account by which to contact him. Determined to get on her good side, Giulio decides to secretly track this man down and even acts in his place (virtually). He’s helped in his endeavour by his loyal friends and classmates (the cast includes Adriano Moretti, Alice Lupparelli, Alice Maselli, Aleandro Falciglia, Bea Barret and Christian Dei, with a bonus appearance from the rising singer-songwriter Ditonellapiaga), who, between repeating history and literature classes, go along with Giulio’s game and are lent vital support by one of their fathers (played by Gian Marco Tognazzi), who knows exactly how to win over an ‘80s girl.
Electronic registers, social networks, scooters, fluidity, polyamory, ecoanxiety, pokè: the film immerses itself in the Generation Z universe, but it also nods to the adults in the audience who once created mixed tapes to communicate their feelings to the objects of their desire. The film flows easily, raising plenty of smiles, and the cast are all in sync; unfortunately, the story is based on a misunderstanding which should have been better thought through from the outset in order to make the ensemble more convincing. All in all, it’s a gentle comedy which celebrates love in all its forms, but it also offers a snapshot of a generalised sense of uncertainty and disorientation among the youth of today and of yesterday.
Notte prima degli esami 3.0 was produced by Italian International Film together with RAI Cinema, in collaboration with Buonaluna.
(Translated from Italian)
